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Chill Out (KLF album)

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For other uses, see chill out (disambiguation).

Untitled
"Dream Time in Lake Jackson"
Ethnic Tuvan throat singing underscored by ethereal synthesiser sounds.
"Elvis on the Radio, Steel Guitar in my Soul"
Graham Lee's pedal steel accompanies Elvis Presley's "In the Ghetto", with sampled rolling stock.
"Wichita Lineman Was a Song I Once Heard"
The distinctive strings of The KLF's original "Last Train to Trancentral" are prominent. The build-up features samples of a furiously intense salesman.
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Chill Out is the third studio album by The KLF, and the first album under the name, released in February 1990. An ambient house concept album, it portrays a mythical night-time journey up the US Gulf Coast from Texas into Louisiana. The album is a continuous composition, in which sampled music (including Elvis Presley, Fleetwood Mac, Acker Bilk and Tuvan throat singers), vocal samples and sound effects are overlaid with original music.

Context

Composition and recording

Chill Out is a single continuous musical piece having many distinctive sections, each of which either segues into or introduces the next. The album as a whole is a progression, with percussion gradually introduced during the second half. The KLF have stated in interviews that the album was recorded in a 44-minute "live" take in their studio, Trancentral, located in the basement of The KLF member Jimmy Cauty's squat in Stockwell, South London.[1] These took place at both Trancentral and the monthly 'Land of Oz' at London's Heaven nightclub. Said Cauty, "There's no edits on it. Quite a few times we'd get near the end and make a mistake and so we'd have to go all the way back to the beginning and set it all up again". According to Cauty's co-founder of The KLF, Bill Drummond, the album took two days to put together.[1] Record Collector compared The KLF's production method to that of established electronic musicians: "While electronic dinosaurs like Jean Michel Jarre and Klaus Schulze were walling themselves in with banks and banks of synthesizers, computers and electronic gadgetry the KLF were doing the opposite—making a crafted work like Chill Out with the bare necessities of musical survival."[1]

After recording, the duo thought the sound to be evocative of a trip through the American Deep South. Drummond said "I've never been to those places. I don't know what those places are like, but in my head, I can imagine those sounds coming from those places, just looking at the map."[2] The titles of the parts are poetic descriptions—often complete sentences—incorporating statements of time, place and situation along the Gulf Coast journey.

The album has many recurring musical elements, which unify and merge the parts into the collective whole. Common characteristics of most parts include ethereal background synthesizers, the use of echo and pitch bend, samples of nature and transport, and the punctuation of soft synthesizer loops by sudden flourishes of harmonious sound. The Deep South is variously represented using original pedal steel contributions from Graham Lee and emotionally charged samples of US radio broadcasts: an evangelist's sermon, a range of samples of a very intense salesman, and, in "Madrugada Eterna",[3] the detailed news report of a fatal road accident.

Despite the specific US settings, Chill Out is multi-ethnic, its journey taking in pastoral shepherds, Russian broadcasts, Tuvan throat singers ("Dream Time in Lake Jackson"), exotic birds, and an African-sounding original female vocal from The JAMs' 1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?) that later became The KLF's "Justified and Ancient".

Elements of The KLF's "Pure Trance" singles "3 a.m. Eternal" and "Last Train to Trancentral" are brought to the fore during the second half of the album, progressing from the minimalist synths of the opening half. Similarly, samples of other artists' work appear as the composition develops, harmonising with The KLF's original instrumentation.

Parts of the original Trancentral and Land of Oz sessions not used for Chill Out were developed to become The Orb's single "A Huge Ever Growing Pulsating Brain That Rules from the Centre of the Ultraworld" and the ambient KLF Communications album Space. There are also several bootleg recordings available with additional versions.

Identified samples

The samples used in Chill Out contribute fundamentally to the character of the composition. In particular, the recurring sampled sound effects of rolling stock and other transport illustrate the journey concept, often during segues between parts of the composition. Many of these effects are taken from the 1987 CD version of Elektra Records' Authentic Sound Effects Volume 2. The tracks used are "Crossing Bells and Horn with Electric Train Pass" and "Short Freight Train Pass", along with processed versions of "F18 Diamond Fly-By", "Dodge Van Starts, Drives Out", and "Surf".[4] Samples of American, British and Russian radio stations are also used, including the BBC pips and a jingle from Tommy Vance's Friday Rock Show on BBC Radio 1: "Rock radio into the nineties and beyond". Some of the more obscure sounds (Tuvan throat singers and Basque shepherds in the Pyrenees) come from the Saydisc Records soundtrack of the 1980s "Disappearing World" series on Granada TV in the UK. The phrase "Your feeling of helpnessness is your best friend, savage" is taken from the 1957 science fiction film The Brain from Planet Arous.

The album features samples of distinctive melodies from the musical recordings of other artists: Elvis Presley's 1969 UK No. 2 single "In the Ghetto", Fleetwood Mac's 1968 UK No. 1 single "Albatross", as well as "Oh Well Part II", and Acker Bilk's 1961 US No. 1 single "Stranger on the Shore" all feature prominently, in each case set to an accompaniment of original music. The composers of these hits receive co-writing credit for "Elvis on the Radio Steel Guitar in My Soul", "3am Somewhere out of Beaumont", and "A Melody from a Past Life Keeps Pulling Me Back" respectively, and the performers are thanked in the Chill Out sleevenotes.[5] Boy George's band Jesus Loves You is also thanked for a sample from the single "After the Love", which features on "3am Somewhere out of Beaumont". Short samples from the Van Halen instrumental "Eruption" emerge throughout the song "A Melody from a Past Life Keeps Pulling Me Back". Shortly after the 2:00 mark of "The Lights of Baton Rouge Pass By", a sample from the theme music of The Big Country can be heard.

Reviews and influence

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[6]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music[7]
NME8/10[8]
Q (1990)[9]
Q (1994)[10]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[11]
Spin Alternative Record Guide9/10[12]
Sputnikmusic4.5/5[13]

Ian Cranna of Q, in a review published at the time of the album's release, described Chill Out as an "impressionist soundtrack" whose "spartan but melodic electronic strains ease gently through wide open spaces", and concluded that the album is "both imaginative in itself and successful in inducing a blissed out mood of peace and relaxation (at least at night)."[9] Helen Mead of NME called the album "a riot of running water, birdsong and electronic womb music".[8] Ian McCann of The Face proposed that if the listener is not under the influence of drugs, the album sounds "hopelessly pompous and almost classical."[14]

In a 1994 retrospective review, Q's Andrew Collins called The KLF "ahead of their time" and added that "the fact that Chill Out was seen largely as a urinary extraction exercise[15] at the time when such sound-painting now shapes young careers lends poignancy to its more balmy yet knowing moments."[10] The Times called the album The KLF's "comedown classic",[16] while John Bush of AllMusic awarded the album five stars and cited it as "one of the essential ambient albums".[6] In an "On Second Thought" review in Stylus Magazine, writer Scott Plagenhoef found Chill Out to be "less a morning after and more the slow awakening to a new day" and an album which "slowly unfolds its charms".[17]

In a 1996 feature, Mixmag named Chill Out the fifth best dance album of all time, citing Jimmy Cauty and Alex Paterson as having "kickstarted" ambient music with their DJ sets at the "seminal" house night "Land of Oz". Dom Philips of Mixmag described Chill Out as "a gorgeous patchwork of sound, noise and melody... the samples are carefully woven into a beautiful spider's web of sound."[18] Ira Robbins of Trouser Press was less favorable in his assessment of Chill Out, likening it to "an accidental recording of 1970 Pink Floyd sessions during which all the participants have either left or fallen asleep", adding that "it's the pleasantly attenuated soundtrack to a non-existent film that is easily forgotten."[19] In 2008, Pitchfork Media included "Wichita Lineman Was a Song I Once Heard" in The Pitchfork 500, their list of the 500 greatest songs between 1983 and 2008, and later ranked the track at number 80 in their "Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s" list in 2010.[20]

In July 2004, UK performance collective Popdamage "reconstructed" Chill Out as a live performance at The Big Chill music festival, recreating many of the album's vocal and musical samples live on-stage.[21]

Themes

The use of a journey as a unifying musical or conceptual thread featured several times in Cauty and Drummond's work, including The White Room, "Last Train to Trancentral", "Justified and Ancient" and "America: What Time Is Love?". Cauty's Space and The Orb's debut album, The Orb's Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld also employ the journey concept.

Sheep, which appear both on the recording of Chill Out and in its sleeve artwork, became a theme of The KLF's output, featuring in the ambient video Waiting, The White Room album artwork, and later — in a macabre gesture — at their controversial appearance at the 1992 Brit Awards ceremony. When questioned about the Chill Out sleeve, Drummond explained:

That's a very English thing and it has the vibe of the rave scene over here. When we're having the big Orbital raves[22] out in the country, and you're dancing all night and then the sun would come up in the morning, and then you'd be surrounded by this English rural countryside... we wanted something that kind of reflected that, that feeling the day after the rave, that's what we wanted the music for.[2]

In the same interview Drummond also credited the sleeve of Pink Floyd's Atom Heart Mother as providing inspiration.[2]

Bill Drummond has documented his affinity for pedal steel and country music, stating that although he has "loved all sorts of music, ... country music is the only music [he's] been totally able to identify with", and declaring: "the weep of a pedal steel guitar is the sound of heartstrings being torn".[23]

In August 1990, the single "What Time Is Love? (Remodelled & Remixed)" was released. It included the ambient house "Virtual Reality Mix", reprising many elements of Chill Out. Elements of Chill Out also featured heavily in The KLF's "U.F.O. remix" of "It Must Be Obvious" by Pet Shop Boys, released in September 1990.

Personnel

Jimmy Cauty and Bill Drummond are credited on the sleeve for "composition, compilation and collation" of the album.[5] The Orb split in April 1990, with Paterson retaining the name. The subsequent release of the ambient Space LP—originally intended to be The Orb's debut album[24] —was credited only to Cauty.[25]

Track listing

The track listing of Chill Out uses the start- and end-points of the parts, instead of the conventional track numbering system, indicating that the album be treated as a single composition. For the original KLF Communications CD release, the entire album was written to one track.

  1. "Brownsville Turnaround on the Tex-Mex Border" – 1:43
  2. "Pulling out of Ricardo and the Dusk is Falling Fast" – 1:29
  3. "Six Hours to Louisiana, Black Coffee Going Cold" – 3:01
  4. "Dream Time in Lake Jackson" – 2:37 sampleⓘ
  5. "Madrugada Eterna" – 7:41
  6. "Justified and Ancient Seems a Long Time Ago" – 1:09
  7. "Elvis on the Radio, Steel Guitar in My Soul" – 2:40 sampleⓘ
  8. "3 a.m. Somewhere out of Beaumont" – 9:50
  9. "Wichita Lineman Was a Song I Once Heard" – 5:57 sampleⓘ
  10. "Trancentral Lost in My Mind" – 0:56
  11. "The Lights of Baton Rouge Pass By" – 3:26
  12. "A Melody from a Past Life Keeps Pulling Me Back" – 1:51
  13. "Rock Radio into the Nineties and Beyond" – 1:27
  14. "Alone Again with the Dawn Coming Up" – 0:19

Notes

  • Longmire, Ernie et al. (2005). KLF discography. Compiled by Ernie Longmire, this has been the authoritative KLF discography on the internet for some 10 years or more and has been the subject of long-term scrutiny and peer review by KLF fans and collectors. It is now defunct and replaced by the fan page at www.facebook.com/klf.de.
  • Weisbard, Eric; Craig Marks (1995). Spin Alternative Record Guide. Vintage Books. ISBN 0-679-75574-8.

References

  1. ^ a b c "The KLF: Enigmatic Dance Duo", Record Collector, 1 April 1991 (link).
  2. ^ a b c Longmire, Ernie ("Lazlo Nibble"), "KLF is Gonna Rock Ya!", X Magazine, 1 April 1991 (link).
  3. ^ "Madrugada Eterna" is Spanish for "Eternal Dawn".
  4. ^ Authentic Sound Effects Volume 2, Elektra Records 1987 (link to audio samples).
  5. ^ a b KLF Communications, Chill Out JAMS LP5, sleevenotes, February 1990.
  6. ^ a b Bush, John. "Chill Out – The KLF". AllMusic. Retrieved 16 November 2015.
  7. ^ Larkin, Colin (2007). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (5th ed.). Omnibus Press. ISBN 0-857-12595-8.
  8. ^ a b Mead, Helen (20 January 1990). "The KLF: Chill Out". NME.
  9. ^ a b Cranna, Ian (February 1990). "The KLF: Chill Out". Q (41).
  10. ^ a b Collins, Andrew (June 1994). "The KLF: Chill Out". Q (93).
  11. ^ Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian, eds. (2004). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide. Simon & Schuster. p. 462. ISBN 0-743-20169-8.
  12. ^ Weisbard, Eric; Marks, Craig, eds. (1995). Spin Alternative Record Guide. Vintage Books. p. 213. ISBN 0-679-75574-8.
  13. ^ Robertson, Alex (1 April 2011). "The KLF – Chill Out". Sputnikmusic. Retrieved 16 November 2015.
  14. ^ Cranna, Ian (February 1990). "The KLF: Chill Out". The Face. 2 (17).
  15. ^ A "urinary extraction exercise" is (in convoluted British slang) a "piss take" – a targeted joke disguised as something serious.
  16. ^ Fields, Paddy. "And you thought they were dead". The Times. No. 4 May 2001. London. p. 2. ISSN 0140-0460.
  17. ^ Plagenhoef, Scott (1 September 2003). "On Second Thought – The KLF – Chill Out". Stylus Magazine. Retrieved 4 January 2008.
  18. ^ Philips, Dom (March 1996). "50 Greatest Dance Albums: #5"". Mixmag.
  19. ^ Robbins, Ira. "The KLF". Trouser Press. Retrieved 19 April 2006.
  20. ^ "Wichita Lineman Was a Song I Once Heard". Acclaimed Music. Retrieved 1 February 2016.
  21. ^ Verrico, L. (2 August 2004). "The Big Chill, Herefordshire" review". The Times. London.
  22. ^ The term "Orbital raves" refers to those being held in London's Metropolitan Green Belt, close to the M25 Orbital Motorway.
  23. ^ Drummond, B., "They Called Me Up in Tennessee", 45, (Little & Brown, ISBN 0-316-85385-2 / Abacus, ISBN 0-349-11289-4), 2000.
  24. ^ "The White Room: Information Sheet 8", KLF Communications, 1990 (link).
  25. ^ Sleevenotes, Space, KLF Communications, SPACE LP1, July 1990.
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